Healthy increase in number of nurses

Human resources manager David Foden reported to the Royal Berkshire and Battle Hospitals NHS Trust board meeting on Tuesday last week that general nursing staff numbers had increased from 920 to 1,120, a 20 per cent increase, since 1993.

Although the turnover of qualified nurses has dropped to 17 per cent, the turnover of unqualified nursing staff is still very high at 36 per cent.

Mr Foden said that 40 per cent of unqualified nurses left the trust for better jobs with more money, 20 per cent left the area and 15 per cent left to gain nursing qualifications.

To find out why staff leave and do more to keep them happy in their work, the trust will be conducting a second staff attitude survey next month.

The survey will be analysed by The University of Birmingham and the trust will have the results in the autumn.

It will be looking in particular at what staff feel about training and development.

Non-executive director Annette Haworth said it was no surprise that there was a high turnover of unqualified staff considering the low

levels of pay.

She cited a recent incident when she watched a health care assistant giving a drink to a patient.

She said: "I couldn't help thinking that she was being paid £4.47 an hour when she could be earning £5 an hour pushing a Hoover round in someone's home. It's no

wonder we have a problem."

The hospital is currently recruiting nursing staff in Spain where there is a

surplus of nurses.

Mr Foden said the hospital was looking into the possibility of recruiting in Indonesia but he said "that is a bit iffy at the moment".

He said that of the 160 new nurses recruited since mid May, 68 were from overseas.

He said absenteeism was dropping but the trust had not quite reached its year end target of 3.4 per cent, actually achieving 3.6 per cent.

Colin Maclean, who chairs the board, said: "It's our responsibility to make sure that people see the attractiveness of working at this hospital. It is an interesting place to work."